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Saturday, March 8, 2014

I Think, Maybe, I Just Got Profiled ... As a Dad?

﻿﻿At first, I laughed, because that’s what I usually do when I
don’t hear something a stranger says to me.Then it dawned on me what she said, and I didn’t know whether I should
be offended instead.

“That’s so you don’t have to do the dishes, ” she quipped
matter-of-factly, with a smirk.

I was in Target, getting some random supplies for the
homestead:Razors for me, pull-ups for
the boy, cat food for … well, that’s obvious. And it just so happened that we
were out of paper plates. So I got those also, in two sizes – dinner and desert.

While I was loading the two stacks of paper plates into the cart, the older
woman passing by looked at me and said it, with a smirk.

That’s so you don’t have to do the dishes.

Not making light of Dad repression.
I just really love Monty Python.

For the record, we don’t use paper plates a lot around our house.
We like to have them on hand in case we have company with other kids, or we
have a birthday cake to dispense, or we’re just feeling tired and want to
avoid doing the dishes before bedtime. It’s a common feeling when you have
kids.

Also for the record, I do a lot of the cooking and shopping
in our house. We are a thoroughly modern family in that way. I also do the dishes
a portion of the time. Of course, my wife would tell you that, when I am
the one who does the dishes, I never dry them and just leave the last ones cleaned
and stacked on the counter. I often get in trouble for not drying and putting
them away when it’s my turn to do the dishes. Ironically, I also get in trouble
for not drying and putting them away when it’s her turn to do the dishes.But that’s another blog altogether – one I’ll
never write.

When this random woman at Target made her wise crack, I laughed. Maybe she was just joking. It was a perfectly funny thing to
say.But maybe she wasn’t.Maybe she was really saying, “Typical man,
buying paper plates so he doesn’t have to do the dishes.”And maybe she was thinking, he’s probably single
and lives in a cave, or his wife must be out of town.

I know other dads – some I’ve met through dad blogging circles
(it’s cooler than it sounds) -- who’d certainly be offended by that comment, especially
the single dads or those stay-at-homers who always take lead on household chores like
dishes. There are dadvocates out there who
would chalk this up as one more example of how the mom-dominated culture is profiling, discriminating, and working to keep good dads down.

And the dadvocates would write about it. I know, because I’ve read the articles about random people
who’ve said random things to them in public places that were potentially or
ostensibly offensive. Like the dad whose
baby had soiled its diaper at a library, and had a mom say to him, as he
grabbed a diaper and headed for the bathroom, “Do you want me to handle that?” That well-intended gesture was pretty loaded.(Excuse the pun).

I always wondered why nothing like that ever happened to me.But was this comment about doing the dishes anything like
that?

Just for a second, imagine if the roles were reversed, and I said it to her as she
loaded a cart full of paper plates:“That’s
so you don’t have to do the dishes.”

Totally different meaning, totally different offense. And,
holy crap, is it offensive. Very. Even if I was just joking. They probably would have banned me from Target (if they could catch me).

Still, maybe it was just a harmless joke.Maybe, she would have said the same thing to
a mom buying paper plates. Maybe, with her little quip and accompanying smirk,
she was letting me into the secret club of shoppers, child-caretakers and just-plain-old parents who all know that some days you just don’t have any energy to
do the freaking dishes.

Besides, she was right. That's exactly why I was buying paper plates.

So, at first I laughed.Then
I thought I should be offended.Yet, for
some reason, it made me happy.I’d never
been profiled as a dad before – at least not since I was aware such things
happened.

Now, I had. I think.Like the article? Know others who may enjoy reading it? Please share it using the buttons below or to the left. Thank you.

Interesting story. I also had a Target Dad Moment a while back. A woman approached me after recognizing my youngest son by my side and she said, "hey, I see you at my son's school ... you're a really good dad." I smiled, and beamed a bit, but what made me a good dad? The fact that I drop my kids off at school every morning? Would she say that to a mom who did the same thing?

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About Me

I'm a writer, a husband and a father of four. I once worked in news in Washington, D.C., and served as a speechwriter for a spell. Now I work in upstate New York, teach and help raise our kids. This is where I write about it.